How India Earns, Spends and Saves maps the earning, spending and saving profiles of Indians in the post-liberalisation era. It studies how socio-economic, religious and individual characteristics lead to inequality in the incomes of households. Among other aspects of the problematique, it reveals that while a household’s income is primarily dependent on socio-economic factors (occupation, education and age of its chief earner), its economic prosperity is impacted by factors like its spending and saving levels, sectors of employment of members, state of residence, and so on.

The book is based on the results of the National Survey of Household Income and Expenditure (NSHIE) 2004–05, conducted under the aegis of the National Council for Applied Economics Research (NCAER). It not only offers valuable insights for economic analysts, policy makers, development professionals and academics, but the primary data of the survey also offers opportunities for further research.

Foreword Rama Bijapurkar

Message Suman Bery

Introduction

Earning Pattern of Indian Households

Spending Pattern of Indian Households

Saving Pattern of Indian Households

Income Pyramid - Distribution and Income Disparity

Rural Well Being

Urban Well Being

Annexure: Concepts, Definitions and Survey Methodology

Index

The book offers an opportunity to economic analysts, media, policy makers, marketing professionals, development professionals and students to understand how India’s growth story has unfolded. It also offers the opportunity to evolve gender-sensitive policies in the face of national economic growth…The book is a scholarly publication. The flawless editing and proof reading of the book is admirable. The book is a significant contribution to the study of India’s ‘Consumer Economics’

The Journal of Entrepreneurship

This book nicely collates the key findings of the National Survey of Households Income and Expenditure (NSHIE) and will serve as a handbook for all those who work on household survey-based studies in the context of India. It will also be useful for those who are trying to understand how Indian consumers are changing.

South Asia Economic Journal

The book provides valuable quantities insights into the dynamics of India’s growth story…. The most significant contribution of the study is in providing quantitative authentification to widely held notions which often do not get the importance they ideally should, owing to their qualitative leanings. The study clearly scores over other similar works in terms of richness of data and the level disaggregation. It will be of interest to and useful reference for economic analysts, policy-makers, development professionals and policy think tanks. Undoubtedly, the book will be a major driver for further research in the coming years.

ASCI Journal of Management

The survey on which this book is based covered over 440,000 households in rural and urban India spread over 24 states. No previous research project has had such a formidable sample base. It is no overstatement that we had at our disposal data from one of the most scientifically designed and meticulously conducted surveys of its kind in India. The effort, which marks the debut of the NCAER-Centre for Macro Consumer Research (NCAER-CMCR), explores the connection between national economic well-being and phenomenon like urbanisation, consumerism and rural market evolution.